When I hear the word “PowerPoint” or scroll across the icon on my desktop, a smile creeps onto my face. You might share in this if you’re a fan of the television show, “The Office” on NBC. If you didn’t catch episode 4 then your expression likely does not change, but you think of a presentation, right? We all do. That’s what PowerPoint is — “a complete set of tools for making powerful presenations.” While a PowerPoint presentation can be very effective, it can leave some people wanting more if not carefully combined with other tactics…
I read an interesting article about Apple CEO Steve Jobs and the great job he does while delivering a presentation. Carmine Gallo, a communications coach and Emmy-Award winning former tv journalist pulled a top ten list of “best practices” from his most recent presentation. Taken one by one, each tactic (”set the theme” or ”provide an outline”) seems obvious, but when you read the examples she gives the art of this type of communication is revealed.
I particularly like this one: ”Try for an unforgettable moment”. The day after Jobs made his presentation it was the discussion around the office — and by that, I actually mean the Ackermann PR office not the ficticious one on tv. It worked. He went for an unforgettable moment and it worked. The crowd in attendence cheered and people watching this moment on video remembered it and then talked about it. The threshold was met. So what did he do? Jobs achieved this feat by saying the MacBook Air was so thin it could fit into an envelope and then pulled the new laptop from a manila interoffice envelope.
I’ll let you know if I still remember it the next time I have to put together a presentation…
